Joey Madia, New Mystics Reviews

 (Next Chapter 2021). ASIN: B08VH2Z8GK This is the third book I have reviewed from architect and author Pete Adams. The first two were Dead No More (Rhubarb Papers Book 1) in 2021 and Rite Judgement (DaDa Detective Agency Book 2) in 2022. Although all three books are situated in different series, they are united in a single, whimsical world (the 14-book Hegemon Chronicles, of which 11 are written) where multinational corporations, British police and intelligence agencies, and religious organizations come to brilliant life in Adams’s surrealist, socially conscious, quick-witted world. If you are interested in comparisons, Robert Anton Wilson, James Joyce, William S. Burroughs, and Umberto Eco’s Foucault’s Pendulum and Baudolino immediately come to mind.  Like the authors mentioned above, Adams’s intelligence and facility with history, society, culture, politics, and economics are readily apparent, as is the transdisciplinary nature of his themes. For instance, Rite Judgement ha...

  (Prince George, BC, Canada: Dimensionfold Publishing, 2021). ISBN: 9781989940020 We live in an increasingly humorless world, where language is increasingly regulated (and manipulated) and, should you say what is deemed by a certain sector to be the wrong thing , you might just be “canceled” by the swiping, judgmental (read righteous) left thumb of the judgers on social media. In such a sensitive, unsophisticated world, novels such as Munchausen by Proxy for Fun and Profit —written by a father and son—are essential reading. They take on serious subjects (in this case, the illegal sale of prescription drugs) and invite us to see them in a different, nuanced way—through the motivations of the often simple-minded everyday people who deem these courses of action as their only means to participating in Rabid Capitalism. A Cash-Grab Extravaganza from which they imagine everyone else on the planet but them is benefiting. In “real life,” if these dreaming schemers’ stories are inte...

  (Next Chapter, 2021). ASIN: B09HC14QML A few months ago, a publicist introduced me to the whimsical, socially conscious, quick-witted work and worlds of the novelist Pete Adams. John Broughton describes him as “the Salvador Dali of thriller writers,” a description I mention because it is so fitting. Two writers that also come to mind are James Joyce ( Finnegan’s Wake and Ulysses ), and Robert Anton Wilson and his Illuminatus series, although reading his Cosmic Trigger books will also give you a sense of the lineage of which Pete Adams is a part, especially when it comes to the corruption of the international banking cabal. The front matter describes Rite Judgement as “A politically correct / incorrect, risqué, mischievous, irreverent and, ever so naughty, crime mystery thriller. A real / surreal novel where life imitates art.” Quite a mouthful, and quite correct. Following on the heels of this quote is one from André Breton: “The imaginary is what tends to become real.” T...

 (Gumshoe – A Next Chapter Imprint, 2021). ISBN: 9781034490845 “I believe that banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies.” —Thomas Jefferson With this opening epitaph, Pete Adams had me hooked. As the US Federal Reserve (neither Federal nor a Reserve) buys up all it can at a bargain under the banners of Qualitative and Quantitative Easing amid whispers of a trillion-dollar platinum coin Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen could use to avoid a government shutdown, even some old-money families like the Rockefellers in West Virginia are chiming in to say “The Fix Is Fully In.” Dead No More opens with a car fire that kills two police officers—a mother (Dawn) and daughter (Carol)—and facially scars their granddaughter/daughter, Juliet. Carol’s husband, who is “something in the City,” which is code for a man of importance, is also killed. It’s clear that the two officers were murdered because they were working on a case involving high-level families...

In the vast, multi-layered landscape of My Space, it’s easy to get lost. Overwhelmed. As I navigate endless pages of avatars looking for Kindred Spirits, Wise Ones, Ether Inspirations, and new readers, I sometimes wonder just why in the hell I’m wasting my time. As I plunge deeper and deeper into the ice-cold cybersea or walk further and further into the tangled forest of ads, angst, and often false appearances, I search my mental pockets for the crumbling crumbs of bread that may lead me back from the witch’s house that I know I’ll one day find. The best I can do while I’m out there is find some worthy artists to read and review. I “met” poet and essayist Douglas McDaniel through an e-mail he sent me about a Blog I had written concerning the Illuminati. After surfing his My Space I ordered his book 23 Roads to Mythville, a collection of autobiographical and other essays dealing with the nexus of Spirit and Technology in this new age. The language and rhythm come at you at an accelerat...